


Rube Goldberg Machination

by tormalyne



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-21
Updated: 2014-07-21
Packaged: 2018-02-09 18:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1992663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tormalyne/pseuds/tormalyne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mayuzumi’s convinced Akashi is plotting his way into Nijimura’s pants. Nijimura’s just there to play basketball.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rube Goldberg Machination

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for [BPS](http://basketballpoetsociety.tumblr.com) OTP Battle. Now significantly edited!

“So I stopped getting love letters because Akashi had Koyomi-san transferred to another school,” Shuuzou panted out, sounding as skeptical as he could manage while gasping for breath. Practice had only just started, but Rakuzan didn’t believe in easing into anything, let alone warm up laps.

“Not transferred,” wheezed Mayuzumi very seriously. “ _Taken out_. She was getting too close.”

Shuuzou rolled his eyes. Most of the time, he liked Mayuzumi Chihiro well enough. The wild stories about Akashi’s torrid passion for him were a great way to pass the time until the practice part of practice actually started. Some days, though, he had to wonder just what exactly was in all those light novels Mayuzumi always read.

Especially on days when Mayuzumi showed up talking about Akashi pining away since middle school, secretly maneuvering to have his rivals for Shuuzou’s affections eliminated by time traveling assassins or killer duplicates from other dimensions. 

Shuuzou looked at Akashi running effortlessly at the lead of Rakuzan’s basketball team, looking straight ahead without doubt or hesitation in the strong line of his back. He couldn’t imagine Akashi needing something like alien matchmakers to get who he wanted. To get anything he wanted.

Last week, Mayuzumi’s story had been about Akashi’s rise through the ranks of the criminal underworld and his vicious defeat of Kyoto’s most prominent yakuza boss, all to win Shuuzou’s admiration since just being freakishly good at basketball apparently wasn’t cutting it. 

Akashi would look good in the sharp suits and with a gun sleek and gleaming in his hand. He wouldn’t look any more dangerous than he already did on the court.

Shuuzou didn’t tell Mayuzumi that Akashi hadn’t needed to impress him since middleschool. It was nice to think for a second that maybe Akashi would want to all the same. Nice, but meaningless. All Akashi cared about right now was victory, beating away in his heart, his blood, his veins. 

That was how it should be. Shuuzou had come to Rakuzan to win. So had Akashi, no matter what Mayuzumi liked to say about following him out of some puppy dog crush that didn’t exist. He liked Mayuzumi well enough, but Mayuzumi didn’t have the first clue about what was going on in Akashi’s head. 

“She probably didn’t even switch schools,” said Shuuzou. The pace was picking up even more; soon they’d be running sprint laps and wouldn’t have breath enough to talk. “She just stopped hanging around after I rejected her. Girls get embarrassed by that kind of thing.”

Mayuzumi grunted as the pack broke into a flat out run, and that was the end of that.

-

Shuuzou liked Rakuzan, Mayuzumi’s weird stories and all.

He got along with Akashi as well as he ever did, despite visions dancing in his head of Akashi with flying saucers and an evil villain laugh. Akashi was always polite even if he wasn’t really respectful anymore, not like he’d been back at Teikou. That was fine. Akashi was captain now. Akashi was still the same guy Shuuzou had handpicked as his successor, still the person Shuuzou trusted absolutely to get their team the win. 

That was who Shuuzou needed Akashi to be, and who Akashi was. Rakuzan was what Shuuzou needed it to be if he was going to be sticking around.

Rakuzan really wasn’t that different from Teikou, except in the little ways that mattered. He got to play basketball, but he wasn’t a necessary part of the team, not with three Uncrowned and Akashi ready and willing to tear down any comers. Despite the distance, his dad was doing better and his mom always told him in their weekly phone calls that the treatments were going well. Shuuzou could play and not worry about getting that call from the hospital, about being a captain that let down his team.

He knew it was a selfish way to play, but at Rakuzan, he could be as selfish as he wanted to be.

-

“Shuuzou, please remain after practice,” Akashi said. Behind him, Mayuzumi’s mouth dropped open in a round _oh_ of surprise. “I’d like to speak with you about tomorrow’s upcoming game.”

Shuuzou nodded. Mayuzumi made a frantic gesture with his hands, something that looked like ducks mauling each other. Shuuzou ignored him and went back to shooting drills.

-

“I apologize for keeping you so late,” Akashi said. He opened the door.

Five inches of snow blew straight into his face. The wind howled around him, a ripping, tearing thing that plucked at Akashi’s clothes and blew eddying drifts from what was apparently Kyoto’s first freak snow storm ever into the gym.

Shuuzou almost laughed. Even with Aomine’s best attempts at training camps, he’d never seen Akashi with that particular outraged expression, like a cat who’d just been spritzed for bad behavior.

“Right,” Shuuzou said, and lent the weight of his shoulder to shoving the door closed again.

While Akashi made a dignified attempt at clawing the snow off his face, Shuuzou kicked off his shoes. They were already wet through and the snow was turning his toes numb. After a second, Akashi followed suit.

The sting of the cold had left Akashi red cheeked, and his shirt stretched translucent across his shoulders as he knelt to get at the laces. The snow was melting, soaking through his clothes and leaving slick rivulets on his skin, little gleaming trails down the muscles of his arms. 

Akashi shivered noticeably, and Shuuzou sucked in a breath. He was never going to hear the end of it from Mayuzumi. In fact, he was pretty sure Mayuzumi had warned him about something exactly like this.

Of course, Mayuzumi’s story had been a lot more complicated: a cute girl conducting an extremely involved plot to get herself sprayed with a hose right as her dreamy upperclassman walked by. That kind of thing definitely wasn’t what was going on here. Not even Akashi could control the weather.

Probably.

Even if the damp cotton of Akashi’s shirt was clinging really, really closely, outlining the curves of Akashi’s abs.

Shuuzou sighed and leaned forward. Pressed his mouth to the soft curve of the back of Akashi’s neck. Akashi’s skin was warm, a shock of sharpness beneath the cool trails of snowmelt. Shuuzou licked the water away and tasted only crisp chill and the lingering salt of Akashi’s sweat.

“If you say one damn word about warming you up,” he muttered against Akashi’s throat, “or the word _sempai_ leaves your mouth, I’m leaving you here to freeze.”

“Not a word,” Akashi said with annoying agreeableness as Shuuzou pulled him toward the showers. He spent at least fifteen minutes wiping the cat with cream satisfied look right off Akashi’s face.

The next day, Akashi showed up to school without having done a thing to hide the giant red hickey on his neck. Shuuzou took one look at the way there were very clearly teeth marks dipping below Akashi’s collar and made a strangled noise.

Mayuzumi had to sit out the entire practice after he literally laughed himself sick.


End file.
